Joe Biden is facing criticism for making only a late, brief mention of abortion rights in his first State of the Union address since the reversal of Roe v Wade by a conservative-led supreme court last year removed the federal right to the procedure in the US.
During Tuesday’s State of the Union speech, Biden used the word abortion exactly once, making remarks about statewide abortions bans almost an hour into the speech.
“Congress must restore the right that was taken away in Roe v Wade,” said Biden.
“The vice-president and I are doing everything to protect access to reproductive healthcare and safeguard patient safety. But already, more than a dozen states are enforcing extreme abortion bans,” he said.
Biden also reiterated a promise to veto any national abortion ban that might be passed by Congress, although that is unlikely with a Democratic-controlled Senate, despite Republicans having the majority in the House after last November’s midterm elections.
Many abortion-access activists were disappointed at the brevity of Biden’s remarks on abortion.
Abortion rights advocates are not pleased with the very brief section of the #SOTU about abortion rights, which touted what the admin has already done & called on Congress to restore Roe (won't happen in this Congress). No details/pedges of future admin actions.
— Alice Miranda Ollstein (@AliceOllstein) February 8, 2023
Activists were also disappointed because abortion was written twice in a published draft of Biden’s speech.
“These four sentences, and having to be begged to say the word abortion (once! not twice!) does not meet the moment, and is not reflective of how people showed up in droves to the polls to make their voices heard on abortion access,” said Renee Bracey Sherman, executive director of the nonprofit Abortion Stories.
Others noted that Jill Biden’s guests for the State of the Union included a Texas patient who almost died after not being able to receive treatment for pregnancy complications due to the state’s abortion ban, reported the Texas Tribune, which Biden did not make a direction mention of.
Others applauded Biden’s remarks of abortion, including Naral Pro-Choice and Planned Parenthood, reported Politico.
Since the overturning of federal abortion protections last June, Biden has been urged to do more to support abortion access.
Biden has passed several executive orders since the fall of Roe v Wade, including an August directive for the health and human services department to considers ways to protect people traveling out of state for abortion services.
Biden pledged last October to codify the rights afforded by the landmark supreme court decision in 1973 if Democrats kept control of the Congress in the midterm elections, but little progress has been made on any legislative protections since the party lost control of the House.
At least 14 states have banned abortions since Roe was struck down.
